Unity Through Diversity.Dialectics - Systems Thinking - Semiotics

Summary: "Unity through Diversity" (Bertalanffy)
may be considered the system-theoretical equivalent of the sociological
term "conviviality" (Illich). I will apply this notion
to the sphere of cultures in the global society said to come
about and develop a typology of cultural discourses in which
"unity through diversity" seems the preferable option.
I will discuss this typology not only from a system-theoretical
perspective ("evolution of system hierarchies"), but
also demonstrate the appropriateness of dialectical considerations
("the particular and universal") and philosophical/semiotic
thoughts as well ("thirdness", Peirce).

According to Illich, "conviviality" refers to relations
among humans, to the relationship between humans and nature, and
to the relation between humans and technology. It denotes a certain
state of these relations - a state which cannot be achieved unless
the general public assumes control over the tools so as to allow
for the creative power of the individual. Since the general public
is to safeguard the individual, the idea of "conviviality"
includes the idea of reconciliation of unity and diversity. It
is this normative idea of unity-through-diversity that deserves
attention when applying "conviviality" to the level
of world society.

I will discuss dialectical, system-theoretical and semiotic
aspects of unity-in-diversity before addressing its implications
for world society. And in order to find common ground when discussing
dialectical, system-theoretical and semiotic aspects, I will make
use of a typology of ways of thinking.

1. Unity and diversity in ways of thinking

How to conceive of the relationship of unity and diversity
turns out to be of utmost importance, since the design of our
common future depends on it. There are two possibilities. Either
one of the opposites is over-emphasized or both are reconciled.
While the first case may be perceived as subjugation under a strict
rule or as "anything goes", in the second case the opposites
are deemed necessary for each other. It is this last case unity-through-diversity
refers to, which may be looked upon as the leitmotif of the work
of the founder of the general system theory, Ludwig von Bertalanffy
(cf. Gray/Rizzo 1973).

Relating unity and diversity is closely linked to ways of thinking.
Ways of thinking can be seen as ways of considering how to relate
identity and difference.

There are, in terms of ideal types, several ways conceivable:

either the different sides are considered identical, that
is, each side of the difference may be regarded as the base of
identity,

or the different sides are considered different, that is,
all relationships between them are abandoned,

or they are considered to be both identical and different.

Thus we can distinguish between four ways of thinking, which
reveal distinct perspectives of identity and difference and by
that of unity and diversity as well:

one establishes identity by eliminating the difference at
the cost of the differentiated side; it reduces the differentiated
side to the undifferentiated one; this is known as reductionism;
it yields unity without diversity;

a second one establishes identity by eliminating the difference
at the cost of the undifferentiated side; it takes the differentiated
side as its point of departure and extrapolates or projects from
there to the undifferentiated one; it is a way of thinking that
is based upon projection; it is the opposite of reductionism,
but, like reductionism, it means unification and also yields
unity without diversity;

a third one establishes the difference by eliminating identity;
it dissociates both sides of the difference and treats them as
disjunctive; it is a way of thinking that is based upon dissociation;
yielding diversity without unity it is opposed to unification;

a last one establishes identity in line with the difference;
it integrates both sides of the difference (yielding unity) and
it differentiates identity (yielding diversity); it is a way
of thinking that is based upon integration and differentiation;
it is opposed to both unification and dissociation and yields
unity and diversity in one - unity in diversity and diversity
in unity.

2. The dialectic of the particular and the universal

A relationship is usually called "dialectic" if,
firstly, the sides of the relation are opposed to each other;
secondly, both sides depend on each other; thirdly, they form
a relation that is asymmetrical. Regarding the relationship of
the particular and the universal, only the integration-and-differentiation
way of thinking makes it a dialectical one.

Reductionist unification would reduce the particular to the
universal by stating "The Particular is (nothing but) Universal",
and assuming that the universal is the necessary as well as sufficient
condition for the particular. This is true of all kinds of subsumption.
They overlook what goes beyond that which subsumes. Unification
by projection would project the particular onto the universal
and postulate "The Universal is (nothing but) Particular",
thereby meaning that the particular is not only necessary, but
also sufficient to yield the universal. This holds for those illusions
that extend what is in common to a realm where it is not. The
dissociative way of thinking would dissociate the particular from
the universal by presuming "The Particular and the Universal
are Disjoint", and would, in doing so, insinuate that both
notions contradict each other. This leads to letting the particular
fall apart, since there is no unifying bond. Either of these three
ways of thinking is one-sided, because by relying on the formal-logical
figure of necessary and sufficient conditions or of contradiction
it focusses on the mutual dependence of the sides or on being
opposites, and does not comprise the full range of what is characteristic
of any dialectical relation.

It is only the fourth way of thinking that integrates as well
as differentiates the particular and universal. Its point of view
may be formulated "The Particular Sublates the Universal"
- "sublation" in the threefold Hegelian sense denoting
suspending, saving and lifting altogether:

the particular suspends the universal; being the opposite
of the universal, the particular contradicts the universal and
transcends it;

the particular saves the universal; the particular depends
on the universal, the latter being the necessary, but not sufficient
condition for the particular, the particular is based upon the
universal;

the particular lifts the universal to another level; in an
asymmetrical effort, the particular turns the universal, as a
consequence, from an abstract universal into a concrete universal.

The concrete universal is the unity that overarches the diversity
of the particular.

3. Theory of evolving system hierarchies

The dialectic of the particular and universal easily translates
into system concepts.

The core of a yet-to-be-developed evolutionary system theory
is a stage model combining diachronous and synchronous aspects
of systems evolution.

Different system dimensions refer to different system phases
or different system levels. The phases are a characteristic of
the metasystem transition, which brings the system about. The
phases materialize in levels, which make the system hierarchical:

in a first phase there is only a multitude of entities, which
will later on become elements of the system to be formed; in
this phase they cannot be addressed as elements because there
is as yet no system; they do not have bindings to each other
at all; this phase may be called the individual phase;

only in the second phase do these entities begin to develop
relations among themselves, they interact with each other; but
this interactive relationship is not durable, not stable, can
vanish according to the changing activities of the entities involved,
processes may still be reversible; this phase may be called interactional
phase;

it is in a third phase that a system is formed in the course
of interaction and durable, stable relations are established
among the entities which by then turn into elements of just this
system; this phase makes the changes irreversible; it may be
called integrational phase.

Since evolutionary system thinking will consider the original
entities as systems themselves, the emerging system is called
the metasystem.

After the emergence of the metasystem three different levels
making up the remains of the previous transition express a supersystem
hierarchy:

an intra-systemic level focussing exclusively on the internal
processes of a system that is a constituent of the super-system;
it reminds of the individual phase;

an inter-systemic level focussing on the interrelations of
these constituent systems; it reminds of the interactional phase;

and a super-systemic level focussing on the supersystem that
is built by the constituents; it reminds of the integrational
phase.

Hierarchy means that the higher level, while depending on the
lower one, shapes the latter.

Applying the idea of the dialectic of the particular and universal,
metasystem transitions can be regarded as yielding ever more concrete
universals that build the base for ever more particulars on higher
levels in the system hierarchy. That is, given a meta- and/or
supersystem, the entities (as well as the relations they enter)
that play the pre-elementary role during the process of preparation
for the unfolding of the system and that later on play the elementary
role once the system is established form the common ground of
the system. Hence they form the universal. This universal, however,
is differentiated: the entities, when being pre-elementary form,
the abstract universal, the entities, when being elementary, form
the concrete universal.

The universal is at the same time identical to the unity and
the particulars with diversity. So it can be stated that in the
course of evolution unity is enriched by growing diversity.

firstness describes the state of a something in-itself, without
respect to anything else;

secondness describes the state of a something with respect
to another something;

thirdness describes the state of mediation of a something
with another something.

In terms of evolutionary systems, firstness refers to the individual
phase or the intra-systemic level, secondness to the interactional
phase or the inter-systemic level, and thirdness to the integrational
phase or the supra-systemic level. It is worth stressing that,
while it is only the latter phase in which the qualitative leap
to the emerging system is accomplished, and while it is only the
latter level by which the so-called downward causation is exerted,
it is only thirdness in which there is a relator producing the
relation of the relate to the correlate, and by means of that
producing relate as well as correlate. That is to say, thirdness
plays the same extraordinary and unique role in triadic semiotics
as integration and hierarchy do in evolutionary system theory.

Introducing the dialectical terms of particular and universal,
firstness, along with secondness, may be considered abstract-universal,
while thirdness may be considered to include the particular and
the concrete-universal. Thirdness describes a concrete which inheres
the particular shape of the universal by setting up the relation.

Introducing the terms of unity and diversity, things in the
state of firstness or secondness are diverse without there being
a common bond. The unity of the diverse is established only by
thirdness.

In summation, there is a strong parallel between the notion
of the dialectic of the particular and universal, the evolutionary
systems stage model, and the semiotic concepts of firstness, secondness
and thirdness. Seen from the perspective of that way of thinking
that integrates and differentiates at the same time, they translate
into each other and reveal the same basic figure of unity-through-diversity.

5. The one and the many in world society

It makes sense to apply this dialectically, system-theoretically
and semiotically based idea of unity-in-diversity (which underlies
the notion of conviviality) to the field of the partitions of
humanity (which - for reasons of simplicity - I will refer to
in terms of cultural identity) that, due to global challenges
that endanger the species as a whole, and must be met by a single
set of intelligently co-ordinated actions, are in the point of
forming a unit on a planetary scale. It may serve as a normative
idea that guides the measures to be taken to advance world society.
Conviviality is thus a prerequisite of alleviating global challenges.

In this respect the plurality of cultural identities represent
the so-called many (see Hofkirchner 2002). The question is how
one of the many relates to another one and how the many relate
to the oneness that is made up of all the manifold. Is the world
society to become the common denominator of the various identities?
Or is one of the many the only one? Or are the many merely summands
of the individual? Or do the many participate in a one that goes
beyond them?

In order to determine the idea of unity-through-diversity it
is worth excluding what it is not like. According to the four
ways of thinking dealt with in the first section, three of them
do not qualify for a proper foundation of the kind of cultural
intercourse that is needed for consciously constructing the common
future.

The reductionist way of thinking in intercultural discourse
is called "universalism". Cultural universalism reduces
the variety of different cultural identities to what they have
in common. Identities are homogenized by a sort of melting pot
which was named "McWorld" (Barber 2001). Modernism,
that is, the strive for human rights, democracy and capitalism
based on the same mode of metabolism carried out by the same technology
everywhere is universalistic - shimmering between a claim to liberalism
and pompous imperialistic behavior as it is witnessed by its adversaries.
In either case it gets rid of the richness of cultural identities,
the many are reduced to a shallow one; there is no diversity in
the unity.

A second strand in intercultural discourse revolves around
the way of thinking that overuses projection. It may be called
"particularism" or "totalitarianism". Cultural
particularism or totalitarianism extrapolates what separates one
cultural identity from the rest and construes an imaginary common.
It also leads to homogenization. The melting pot in this case,
however, was named "Jihad" (Barber 2001) because it
is the anti-modern fundamentalism that may be a good example for
imposing a certain one out of the many on the rest of them. Here
a culture that is accredited with very specific social relations
is raised to the level of the ideal, which is to serve as a model
for all other cultures to copy. Thus a specific form is built
up to be the general norm. Inasmuch as it is something particular
that is raised in this manner, it concerns particularism. Inasmuch
as it reaches the status of the general norm, it concerns
totalitarianism. This results also in unity without diversity.

A third way of conceiving intercultural discourse is "relativism".
Cultural relativism rests on the figure of dissociation. By denying
any commonality of different cultural identities, it yields fragmentation.
The many fall apart. These concepts of multi-culturalism and separatism
suit postmodern thoughts. Here each of the many cultures are seen
as something with the right to exist and remain free from external
interference. Each special case is made into a norm in its own
right. Inasmuch as it is one of many that is made into
a norm, we may speak of pluralism. Inasmuch as every special
case is treated thus, we must however speak of indifferentism.
Relativism does not claim general validity, and does not wish
to unify anything or anyone. The postmodernist form leaves differences
as they are. Anything goes. World society would simply be diversity
without unity.

None of these three options suffices. None of them can conceive
of a convivial world society. Either the one is regarded as the
necessary and sufficient condition for the many. Or the many are
considered necessary and sufficient for the one. Or one and many
are deemed independent.

Cultural thinking that reconciles the one and the many in terms
of unity-in-diversity is only achievable on the basis of the integration-and-differentiation
way of thinking. It integrates the differences of the manifold
cultural identities and differentiates the common as well. W.
Welsch (in Pongs 1999: 243) coined the term "transculturalism",
and notions of "glocalization" (Robertson 1995) or "new
mestizaje" (a term coined by John Francis Burke in "Reconciling
cultural diversity with a democratic community: mestizaje as opposer
to the usual suspects"; in Wieviorka 2003: 80) are useful
in this context. They may be linked to the concept of reflexive
modernism (Beck 1998).

The process of emergence of a new convivial world society may
be sketched like this, expressed in terms of dialectics, evolutionary
system theory or semiotics: diversity is sublated and leads in
an evolutionary leap to a unity-through-diversity which, in turn,
enables and constrains diversity so as to make it diversity-through-unity,
which thus builds the new base for unity-through-diversity. The
many are the universal that undergoes a transformation from an
abstract universal without a one to a concrete universal, the
one is the particular that colors the universal. World society
is located on the macro-level, the partitions of world society
which are located on the micro-level take care of the world society
in order to preserve humanity. World society is a third that assigns
new meaning to its partitions which were a first and its relations
which were a second.

(*) This article was written in the
context of the research project "Human Strategies in Complexity:
Philosophical Foundations for a Theory of Evolutionary Systems"
funded by INTAS (The International Association for the Promotion
of Cooperation with Scientists from the New Independent States
of the former Soviet Union) and the Austrian Federal Ministry
of Education, Science and Culture.